Note (return) — VI. GENERAL PIKE IN CONTROVERSY WITH GENERAL HINDMAN

In some of his contentions, General Pike was most certainly on strong ground and never on stronger than when he argued that the Indians were organized, in a military way, for their own protection and for the defence of their own country. Since first they entered the Confederate service, many had been the times that that truth had been brought home to the authorities and not by Pike426 alone but by several of his subordinates and most often by Colonel Cooper.427 The Indians had many causes of dissatisfaction and sometimes they murmured pretty loudly. Not even Pike's arrangements satisfied them all and his inexplicable conduct in establishing his headquarters at Fort McCulloch was exasperating beyond measure to the Cherokees.428 Why, if he were really sincere in saying that his supreme duty was the defence of Indian Territory, did he not place himself where he could do something, where, for instance, he could take precautions against invasions from